


Top Tier

by thirty2flavors



Category: Borderlands (Video Games)
Genre: Bickering, Comedy, Friendship, Gen, Gen Work, Post-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-02
Updated: 2018-09-02
Packaged: 2019-07-06 03:30:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,353
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15877614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thirty2flavors/pseuds/thirty2flavors
Summary: “I’m your best friend,” Rhys burst out, as though it had been causing him physical pain to keep it in any longer. “You said I was your best friend!"Fiona wrinkled her nose. “What? Ew. No, I didn’t.”Fiona misspeaks. Rhys doesn't let her forget it.





	Top Tier

**Author's Note:**

> Started this a million years ago after a conversation on Discord that also spawned [some art](https://corporatestooge.tumblr.com/post/174352807162/discord-shenanigans-in-which-fiona-accidentally), but the fic took much longer.
> 
> Shout-out as well to The Mindy Project for what was apparently a very memorable line for me.

Fiona considered herself a patient woman. Both conning and Vault Hunting relied on a willingness to play the long game, to bear the whips and scorns of unpleasantries with an end goal in mind. She could, for some time, tolerate a great many things. 

But this was pushing it. 

“Okay,” Fiona tutted, waving a single finger in reprimand. “Nope. That’s enough. Stop that.” 

Seated on the sofa opposite her, Rhys froze, his arm suspended a couple inches above Sasha’s shoulders. “I’m not doing anything!”

“You were gonna.” Fiona spoke around the potato chip she popped into her mouth. “I can see it in your eyes. And don’t think I didn’t notice your little game of footsies.” 

Rhys glared at her. 

“He hasn’t done anything,” Sasha insisted, pointedly pulling Rhys’ arm down around her. 

But Fiona shook her head. 

“Oh, you’re not innocent either. You’ve been playing with his hair for like, three minutes,” she said, an attorney laying out her evidence. “Pretty soon your fingers will be cemented there by his excessive use of product.” 

“You’re being immature, Fi,” said Sasha.

Fiona scoffed. “I’m being immature?” She ate another chip and shook her head. “I’m not the one necking like a teenager at the dinner table.” 

“We’re not _necking_.” Rhys rolled his eyes. “Who says ‘necking’? Are you 90?” 

“And it’s not the dinner table,” added Sasha, nestled into Rhys’ side with her neck at such an uncomfortable angle Fiona assumed it was purely out of spite. “You’re the only one eating.”

“Semantics. The point is, it’s disgusting.” Fiona crunched extra loud. “Vaughn, back me up.” 

“Oh, please.” Rhys smirked. “Vaughn, tell Fiona that her sister’s old enough to go to the malt shop without a chaperone.” 

Having spent the last two minutes feigning interest in the wall, Vaughn looked over with great reluctance. “Oh, I, uh…” He scratched his head. “You know what, I’m just… gonna... go… do some crunches,” he announced.

He stood abruptly and moved to the corner to do just that. 

“Vaughn agrees with me,” said Fiona. She pointed a chip in their direction before Rhys could protest further. “Point is, I don’t want to see my best friend canoodling with my sister.” She popped the chip in her mouth and spoke around it. “It ruins the appetite.”

Rhys’ jaw dropped and Sasha’s eyes went wide, and for a short, blessed moment, Fiona thought perhaps she’d made her point, and that they were seeing sense. In the blissful moment of silence that followed, she stuffed another chip into her mouth.

Then Rhys found his voice, albeit a squeakier one than normal. “Holy shit. Everyone else heard that, right? I’m not having one of those auditory hallucinations?” 

“I heard it,” said Sasha.

“Me too,” agreed Vaughn, frozen mid-crunch. 

Fiona munched through her food with an impatient shake of her head. “Yeah, I should hope so, I was talking to you.”

Rhys’ shocked expression turned to one of sheer delight, his slackened jaw giving way to a toothy, open-mouthed grin. His hand tapped Sasha’s shoulder frantically. 

“Oh my god,” he said. “Oh my god. _Oh my god_.”

Fiona narrowed her eyes as she chewed. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

“Fi,” said Sasha slowly, a sparkle in her eyes, “think about what you just said.”

“I said I want you hormonal idiots to have some public decency—”

“No,” corrected Sasha, “what you _said_ was—”

“I’m your best friend,” Rhys burst out, as though it had been causing him physical pain to keep it in any longer. “You said I was your best friend!”

Fiona wrinkled her nose. “What? Ew. No, I didn’t.”

“You definitely did,” Rhys insisted.

“Yeah,” said Vaughn.

“It’s true,” said Sasha. 

Fiona shook her head. “You guys are crazy.” She drew herself up taller in her chair to compensate for the blood rushing to her cheeks. “I didn’t say that. I would never say that. Sasha’s my best friend. I—”

Rhys was firm and smug. “You said, ‘my best friend canoodling with my sister’—”

“You can’t have meant Sasha, ‘cause Sasha can’t canoodle with herself,” Vaughn reasoned.

“Well, I _can_ ,” Sasha muttered, “but that’s not what you meant.” 

Fiona opened and closed her mouth, scrambling for a defense, but no sound came out. Rhys jumped on her silence, rising from his seat and creeping over to her with one hand braced on his chest. Fiona scowled as fiercely as she could.

“That’s—that’s not—that was a verbal error, okay, I wasn’t—you’re not—”

“Awww, Fi,” Rhys cooed, the sickly-sweet smile on his lips at odds with the mischievous glint in his eyes. “It’s so nice to know you care.” He stepped closer, arms outstretched. 

“Don’t you dare,” said Fiona. 

Cavalierly ignoring the threat, Rhys wrapped his arms around her shoulders and reeled her in while Fiona sat stock-still and stiff. She could hear Sasha and Vaughn’s muffled laughter. 

“Now, I don’t want you to be jealous of Vaughn, all right?” Rhys’ voice was right in her ear; Fiona tried to wriggle away, but her arms were trapped and the grip of his prosthetic was surprisingly strong. “Best friend is a tier. You can totally have more than one.” 

“I’m going to punch you in the throat,” Fiona growled, which only made Rhys squeeze her tighter. Finally, she managed to land an elbow in the right spot. “Get off me, jackass.”

Rhys pulled away, his beaming smile as bright as ever. “Whatever you say, _bestie_.”

He winked, dodged Fiona’s swipe at him, and then walked to the kitchen, head thrown back in laughter.

* * *

Fiona paid for her mistake for the next week. Rhys was the ringleader of mockery, but Sasha and Vaughn joined in too, referring to him not by name but exclusively as “Fiona’s best friend” at every possible opportunity. 

To say the least, it was deeply infuriating. 

Contrary to what the others might say, it wasn’t that Fiona couldn’t take the heat she regularly dished out. It was just that the whole thing was so stupid, a glib remark taken as proof of something it wasn’t. No amount of denying, scowling, threatening or explaining that it’d been a simple slip of the tongue did anything to stem the tide of their jokes. It was going to end badly. Fiona could see it happening. Not a single one of them knew how to leave well enough alone.

Which, admittedly, was the common trait that brought them all together in the first place.

So as the end of the week rolled around and everyone prepared to spread their separate ways again, she found herself plenty ready to head back to Hollow Point and regain a bit of breathing room. She was making her way down one of the quieter spokes of Helios, appreciating the undiluted Elpis light, when someone jogged up behind her.

“Hey, Fiona!” 

She was rolling her eyes before Rhys even reached her side. “Thought you’d be off _canoodling_.” She pulled a face as she said it.

Rhys ignored her, blithely falling into step next to her. “I got something for you.”

“Is it a personal vow of silence? Because that’d be great.” 

“Nope.” He fished something small out of his pocket, dangling on a chain. “It’s a surprise. Close your eyes.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Whatever.” Rhys’ headshake was good-natured. “Here you go.”

He slipped the chain around her neck so quickly Fiona didn’t have time to stop him. The little pendant on the end landed against the bare skin beneath her collar, and she craned her neck to peer down at it.

“What the…?” She held the pendant up with her thumb to study it. There was a jagged edge to one side, like it’d been snapped in half, some writing crudely scribbled down the face. She squinted as she tried to read. “What does this say? Fried…? Rhys, what—?”

“Ta-dah!” Rhys’ face was next to hers as he bent to her height, brandishing his own matching pendant. The rough edge of his clicked against hers like a puzzle, and suddenly the writing made sense.

 _Friends_. Rhys’ half read _Best_. 

Fiona made a noise that could best be described as an animalistic yowl of disgust. Rhys doubled over laughing.

“What is _wrong_ with you?” Fiona demanded, scrambling to pull the chain off her neck, glaring while he clutched his stomach and wheezed. “How are you _this_ annoying?”

Rhys straightened up, though one hand was still holding his side. “Aw, don’t you like it? Made it myself.”

“You know I wasn’t, like, proposing, don’t you?” Fiona snapped, gripping the pendant so tight its rough edge scratched her palm. “I misspoke. That’s it. You realize that, right? Surely even you aren’t that oblivious.”

Rhys’ eyebrows raised along with the volume of her voice, his laughing expression fading to something smaller, more serious. 

“I know you didn’t mean it,” he said simply. “That’s why it’s funny.”

Fiona was unprepared for such a frank reaction. “Oh,” she said dumbly. 

Rhys adopted another smile, but it was conciliatory this time, apologetic. “Look, I know we fight a lot. And, uh, I know you like giving me a hard time. That’s our thing, right? Our witty repartee.”

He pointed two hands’ worth of finger guns in her direction. Fiona raised an eyebrow.

“And, y’know, that’s cool!” he continued. “Part of your charm.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Except… you’re not like that with Sasha. Or Vaughn. Or Athena. Or... anyone, really.” He paused for a second. “Well. Maybe August. But I’m pretty sure you actually don’t like him, so that’s not very reassuring.” The awkward smile on his lips flickered. “Sometimes I wonder if you even...”

He let the sentence fade away into a shrug. Fiona’s train of thought was replaced by white noise. She stared.

Rhys cleared his throat. “Anyway, it was just fun to wind you up. Sorry. I’m done now.” He flashed her another strange, diminished smile. “I’ll see you later, Fiona.” 

He turned on his heel after that, starting back down the hall with his hands in his pockets and that stupid pendant still around his neck. Fiona watched him go in a daze, her anger and irritation extinguished too quickly to be replaced by anything but confused smoke.

She opened her fist, inspecting the necklace he’d given her. She squeezed her eyes shut, scrunched up her face, and groaned.

Then she jogged after him.

“Rhys!” 

He hadn’t made it far; Fiona caught up quickly. Rhys stopped, studying her curiously while she purposefully looked anywhere but his face.

“Rhys,” she said again, feigning interest in a hunk of mud on her shoe. “Here’s the thing. I, uh. Oh, God. Okay.” She pinched the bridge of her nose. “The thing is—” She tried again. “I’m not—” 

“Are you okay?” asked Rhys.

“When you grow up like I did, you kind of learn not to depend on people, ‘cause they’re probably gonna fuck you over,” said Fiona quickly, rushing the words now that she’d found them. “Everyone’s gotta look out for themselves. Even people who seem helpful, or friendly, or whatever, at the end of the day, when it comes down to it, they’re gonna do what’s right for them. That’s just… that’s just how it is around here.”

Fiona imagined that Rhys was shocked by the sudden outburst. She imagined it, because she still couldn’t bring herself to look him in the face. 

“So I sort of… test people. See how hard I have to push before they stay away.” She let out a grim laugh. “Most of the time, it doesn’t take very long.” 

Nervous without reason, she ran her fingers through her streaked hair. In her periphery vision, she saw Rhys open his mouth, and then close it again without speaking. 

“I give you a hard time because…” She lifted one shoulder. “Because I like knowing that I can and it doesn’t change anything.” She considered it for a second. “Well, also because you’re an idiot, and you totally deserve it at least half the time. But mostly the first thing. You don’t go anywhere, no matter how hard I push. You’re loyal to—frankly to the point of stupidity, actually, but I… like it.” 

For once in his life, Rhys stayed quiet. Fiona wasn’t sure if that was a miracle or a curse. She squeezed the necklace in her hand. Finally, she rallied the requisite courage to get to the point.

“I didn’t mean to say it earlier, but it was true. You’re my best friend.” She folded her arms self-consciously. “...Well. You and Sasha. It’s a tier.”

In the split second before she looked up and met his eyes at last, Fiona braced herself for all sorts of things, all manner of gooey, sentimental reactions Rhys was likely to have. The wobbly lip. The hand clutching his chest. Tears, maybe. Three hundred more ugly necklaces.

Instead, when she lifted her head, she found him grinning triumphantly, the mischievous twinkle back in his eyes.

“Ha!” he exclaimed. “I _knew_ it.”

Now it was Fiona’s turn to be speechless. “Huh?”

“Knew I could get you to say it for real,” he answered breezily, smug as ever. He gave the lapels of his jacket a proud tug.

“What?” Fiona’s eyes narrowed, slow and dangerous. “That whole sad baby skag act just now—you were fucking with me? _Seriously?_ ”

“Oh yeah. Hundred percent. I knew you meant it.” He bumped her shoulder with his elbow. “C’mon, we touched a magic box together. That’s for _life_.”

Fiona’s lips compressed to a thin line. Rhys took a step backwards and out of reach; perhaps he had some instinct towards self-preservation, after all. 

“Sweet speech, though,” he continued, immediately disproving her self-preservation theory. “Didn’t peg you for such a softie.” 

“Rhys,” she ground out, a warning unto itself.

“Anyway, I should be on my way. Goodbyes to say, canoodling to do, et cetera.” Happily ignoring the simmering rage on Fiona’s face, he cupped his fingers into a heart shape. “Love you too, Fi.”

Rhys had just enough survival instinct to break into a run a second before Fiona did.

**Author's Note:**

> say hi on tumblr: [@oodlyenough](http://oodlyenough.tumblr.com/)


End file.
